Kyrgyzstan Violence Leaves Uncertainty At the end of a violent and chaotic day [April, 7th], the central Asian republic of Kyrgyzstan seems to have turned another page in its short history.
If opposition sources are to be believed, President Kurmanbek Bakiyev - the charismatic leader of the so-called 2005 Tulip Revolution -...
Ban's Bad Timing In the rarefied world of international diplomacy, timing is everything.
U.N. Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon stumbled into his five-country Central Asia trip this week at the worst possible time. The Republic of Kyrgyzstan, a key stop on the tour, erupted into chaos, leaving Ban helplessly...
U.S. Plays Down Google Breaches to Gain China’s Support on Iran The Obama administration has softened its tone in responding to cyber attacks that may have originated in China, betting that playing down the dispute will help the U.S. obtain the Asian superpower’s cooperation on foreign-policy goals, security experts said.
That calculation may...
Resistance against N. Korean Regime Taking Root, Survey Suggests (...) There is mounting evidence that Kim Jong Il is losing the propaganda war inside North Korea, with more than half the population now listening to foreign news, grass-roots cynicism undercutting state myths and discontent rising even among elites.
A survey of refugees has found that...
Why Obama needs to play his cards right with India What should we make of the kerfuffle over the Indian Prime Minister's state visit to Washington today? Manmohan Singh's summit with President Obama, scheduled in part to offset the president's unfortunate decision not to visit India on his first Asian tour, has been plagued by disappointment in...
China Gains in U.S. Eyes, and India Feels Slights NEW DELHI — The statement [Joint Statement on U.S.-China Relationship], on its surface, seemed like any other bland missive released at the end of a polite visit by a head of state. It was put out by the united States and China after President Obama’s visit there, and said that the...
G20: Cementing a Southern Alliance (...) Major developing countries are again preparing to stand together on critical issues at the G20 heads of government meeting in Pittsburgh Sep 24-25.
But Southern solidarity may need to move beyond the strategic common front presented at such summits to include a strengthening of...
Lessons for the West from Asian Capitalism Singapore—Asian elites have always looked at the world differently from western elites. And after this crisis is over, the gap in perspectives will widen. Asians will naturally view with caution any western advice on economics, particularly because most Asians believe that the crisis has...
Japan Renews Quest for Permanent UNSC Seat Japan made it known that it hoped to take advantage of any momentum in reforming the U.N Security Council to secure a seat as a permanent member. The renewed attention to the issue comes in the wake of an announcement by U.N. General Assembly President Miguel d'Escoto Brockmann last month that...
China Lightens up on Taiwan but Leaves Tibet in the Dark Lacking a democratic mandate, the Communist Party of China relies on two other sources of legitimacy: its success at delivering ever-rising prosperity to the majority of the Chinese people, and its success at uniting China and keeping it united.
If the first source dries up as the economic...
The Meeting of Sergey Lavrov and Hillary Clinton in Geneva (...) Russian-American relations, having undergone an acute crisis in the past year as the result of many years of stagnation, have begun a revival. (...) The meeting between Clinton and Lavrov in Geneva [on March 6, 2009] represents serious negotiations, which should set the stage for the...
Asia's Jewish Myths (...) [Anti-Semitism] conspiracy theories are not rare in Asia. (...)
The Chinese picked up many modern Western ideas from the Japanese. Perhaps this is how Jewish conspiracy theories were passed on as well. But Southeast Asians are not immune to this kind of nonsense either. Former Malaysian...
China's Slump Declaws the Asian Tigers Back in the distant past when all this started – that is, a few months ago – the conventional wisdom was that Asian economies would sail through the credit crunch developing in the West. Not only were their banks in better shape, but the booming trade among them would make up for any...
Cheaper Isn't Better (...) [T]he widely held view until a few months ago was that Asia was coming into its own in economic terms. The mere mention of the continent would conjure up images of booming growth, surging consumer spending and buzzing entrepreneurial energy.
But the reality is that outside of the...
Is the Collective Security Treaty Organization the Real Anti-NATO? Although Western attention has focused on the Shanghai Cooperation Organization (SCO) as a potential threat to Western influence in Eurasia, another institution, the Collective Security Treaty Organization (CSTO), currently represents a more serious near-term challenge.
Last October, the...
